I rushed back to Wuleji Village without stopping. The first thing I did was go find Ha Rina.

She was putting on makeup in the internet cafe. She lifted her eyes to look at me and snorted coldly, “I thought you weren’t coming back.”

“If I don’t come back, who’s going to build you a big house!” I said. “Come on, take me around the village. I’ll treat you to a meal.”

She twisted around and said to the boss, “My sister’s back, I’m going out this afternoon!”

The boss was her uncle. He glared at her. “Where did you get a sister from?”

“None of your business!”

We pushed aside the cotton curtain and walked out. Cheng Xia was standing outside waiting for me.

He’d just vomited three times and was rinsing his mouth with mineral water. He stood there looking lifeless, but still as fresh and handsome as a young scallion.

I said, “This is Ha Rina, my little translator. This is our architect.”

Ha Rina let out a small shriek, covered the eye she hadn’t finished applying makeup to, and ran back into the room in a flash.

Cheng Xia looked bewildered and asked me, “What’s wrong with her?”

When I went back, I had a very vague plan in my mind.

Actually, fundamentally, this wasn’t a conflict between Wuleji Village and Jiaolong Village.

Rather, it was the chronic illness afflicting rural architecture itself.

The houses in Wuleji Village were too old—they neither retained heat nor resisted wind. The roads in front of and behind the houses were muddy, mixed with the feces of cattle and sheep, making walking too painful.

It was unrealistic to make them watch with their own eyes as outsider villagers moved into new houses.

And the county had no money. It was impossible to actually allocate a budget to renovate the entire village. This was a deadlock.

But I was thinking—was there a possibility of solving the problem from another direction?

“Ha Rina said their biggest headache is the problem of staying warm in winter. Coal and such aren’t enough to burn. People can grit their teeth and get through it, but every year a batch of livestock freezes to death,” I said during the company briefing. “If we can guarantee that we’ll help them solve this problem, they’ll definitely make some concessions.”

“That still requires additional budget, and will this make them get along harmoniously with the people of Jiaolong Village? I doubt it,” someone objected.

“I’ll tell them—either we go build the village somewhere else and they can continue freezing,” I said. “Their lowest temperature reaches negative thirty-seven degrees. This is a matter of survival.”

Next came the question of how to produce this plan.

The designer for this project wasn’t skilled enough, and we didn’t have the budget to find a more advanced designer to produce drawings. And for every day of work stoppage, we lost a day’s worth of money.

And I had to quickly produce drawings to negotiate with the villagers.

“I’m not the best designer, but I’m definitely your best choice,” Cheng Xia said to me after hearing all this.

I’d originally just been complaining to him, but he immediately got up to pack his things. By the time I came to my senses, the two of us were already standing at the airport.

Spring had arrived with warm weather and melting snow, and the dirt roads in the village were especially muddy. One step down and you couldn’t pull your foot out for ages. Cheng Xia’s face was deathly pale. Every few steps, Ha Rina and I had to wait for him to vomit for a while.

At first, Ha Rina kept asking me in a low voice, “Sister, is this leader of yours a celebrity or something?”

Later she had a look of complete disdain. “Good-looking but useless! You can’t find a man like this type.”

Cheng Xia said, “No, I feel like my whole foot stepped into cow dung… ugh—”

We toured every single house in the entire village. By the time the sky had darkened, I’d originally wanted to take him to stay at a hotel in the county but it was too late. We could only stay in the prefab building at the construction site.

This place neither retained heat nor prevented theft. Apart from having two boards to block the wind, it was no different from lying in the open field to sleep.

Cheng Xia also quite admirably immediately developed a fever.

I laid out four layers of quilts, stuffed in hot water bottles, and borrowed three small space heaters aimed at him.

His face was bright red, only sticking out one head, like a silly goose.

“I’m so useless!” he let out a goose-like cry.

I comforted him. “It’s okay. I told them you’re from the south. You didn’t embarrass us Northeasterners.”

“That’s great.” He was delirious with fever and quite happy about it.

I laughed uncontrollably and asked him, “Do you still want to stay with me through life and death?”

He smiled very shyly and nodded forcefully.

“Alright, tomorrow we’ll go to a hotel in the county,” I said, tucking in his blankets to comfort him.

Cheng Xia asked again, “Did you always live in this kind of house in Africa?”

“Ours was a long-term project. The walls were much thicker,” I said. “But construction sites—the environment is never that great anywhere.”

But I actually felt it was fine.

The house I grew up in was actually only about thirty-some square meters, stuffed full of junk my grandmother had picked up. In summer it was hot like a steamer, in winter it was too cold. When I did homework, if I didn’t hold a hot water bottle, my hands would be stiff.

So after growing up, no matter how harsh the environment, I never felt particularly unable to adapt.

What really made me feel uneasy was actually going to those high-end hotels, the wine-filled banquets with toasting all around, including Cheng Xia’s home.

These all made me feel at a loss.

Just like how Cheng Xia couldn’t adapt to the construction site’s prefab building.

We came from different worlds. Whether it was me climbing up to the clouds or him descending into the mire, going to each other’s world would be very uncomfortable.

I sighed, then sat down at the desk and started organizing today’s materials.

Cheng Xia said, “You… sleep for a bit before working. If your spirits aren’t good, work efficiency won’t be high either.”

I said, “There are only three days left until the meeting with the county leadership. This stuff has to be done properly. You sleep first.”

Cheng Xia wanted to persuade me again, but under the dual effects of cold medicine and the space heaters, he slowly fell asleep.

I repeatedly looked at the blueprints and calculated the budget, but my head was splitting with pain and I completely couldn’t concentrate.

I could only go out and wash my face with cold water to clear my head.

Outside the window was a galaxy so vast it was somewhat frightening. The stars all over the sky were as bright as a fairy tale, yet the sound of dogs barking in the distance and the wisps of smoke rising from burning sheep dung constantly reminded me—this was the mortal world.

I remembered when I was very young, I lived with my grandmother for a while in a ground-level house. It was a small room attached to a bicycle shed. You had to burn coal briquettes for heat, but it was very warm. My little face was always roasted red.

Why was that place warm? Was it just because the space was small? As I thought about it, the starry sky before me turned into those rows and rows of bicycles, handlebars gleaming silver, bells crisp and clear, rapidly riding toward me.

I instinctively raised my hand to block them, but couldn’t. Those bicycles made of stars, carrying strings of joyful laughter, whooshed past me…

When I opened my eyes again, it was already daylight. The sunlight was so strong I couldn’t open my eyes.

And I was on Cheng Xia’s back. He was struggling to carry me downstairs.

I wanted to ask, but my throat was dry and hoarse. I couldn’t say anything at all.

“Don’t be afraid. We’ll be at the hospital soon.” Cheng Xia helped me into the car.

It was Ha Rina and Qinglong. Cheng Xia said I’d developed a fever to the point of convulsions in the middle of the night. He couldn’t contact our company’s driver, so he could only go find Ha Rina for help.

Supposedly she cried and cursed while calling Qinglong to come and send me to the county hospital.

I drifted in and out of consciousness, letting them drag me along—disinfection, IV drip hooked up.

Damn it, how could I get sick at this time? I was so desperate I wanted to cry, but had no energy. I could only lie there weakly.

Ha Rina said, “The doctor said if this injection doesn’t bring down your fever, it’ll be dangerous. You’ll have to go to the big hospital in the city.”

“I’m not going… I want my computer.”

Cheng Xia pressed me down firmly, speaking sternly, “I’m telling you, you can’t always rely on working yourself to death to get through difficulties. When it’s time to rest and recover properly, you stay put for me.”

Ha Rina was very angry. She couldn’t understand what Cheng Xia meant either. She just put her hands on her hips and yelled back at him, “My sister is sick! What are you being so fierce for? Being a leader makes you so great?!”

Cheng Xia sighed. He said, “I’m not a leader. You… can call me brother-in-law.”

While I was getting the IV, Bao Long and the others rushed over. Cheng Xia said something to them, and they left again.

Probably due to the medication, no matter how anxious I was, I drowsily fell asleep. Cheng Xia and Ha Rina left together and only came back in the evening.

Cheng Xia brought many things.

Including a very thick nightgown, fluffy slippers, a thermal cup, canned sweet syrup, coffee, hand cream…

He even took out a packet of Chinese herbal medicine for me to soak my feet in, and then while I was soaking my feet, he applied a face mask for me.

…Never mind while hospitalized—I’d never been this refined even in my daily life.

“The more anxious and restless you are, the more you need to live well,” he said.

In the gently rising steam, my anxious mood also calmed down a bit. The hospital environment was noisy and chaotic, but our area was clean and refreshing.

Cheng Xia sat on the simple bed, drinking coffee while drawing on his laptop. I actually felt an unfounded sense of peaceful tranquility.

…Peaceful tranquility my ass! There were only two days left until the meeting!

I asked, “So what did you do all afternoon? Don’t tell me you just went shopping!”

He said, “And basked in the sun, felt the wind here.”

…

I was in the hospital burning with anxiety, and you were playing at being artistic outside!

Cheng Xia smiled and said, “The wind that blows here is the northwest wind.”

“The reason you felt warm in the bicycle shed’s small room, besides the small area, there were two other reasons. First, the small room was surrounded by buildings. Nearby tall buildings blocked the wind. Second, sunlight entered the bicycle shed, creating a heat storage effect that was then conducted to the small room.”

He softly explained those awkward professional terms into plain language for me to hear.

“Why do we feel that Wuleji Village is extremely cold? Because the village’s buildings are scattered. When the northwest wind comes in winter and spring, cold wind corridors form inside. If when building Jiaolong Village’s housing, we intersperse them among the old houses, making the entire building layout concentrated and compact, it will help form a good microclimate environment and also allow the original buildings to avoid invasion by the cold wind.”

At the county committee meeting, I tried my best to imitate Cheng Xia’s manner, calmly and professionally explaining my new plan.

They were all very serious. Apart from my voice, the entire room was so quiet you could hear a pin drop.

One leader asked, “Since the houses facing northwest bear the role of blocking wind, how do you ensure their warmth?”

“Using solar heat storage. Those old houses have major problems—none of them collect heat. We can add a sunroom, which means adding a glass warm corridor on the south-facing sunny side. It can effectively preserve solar heat energy, then conduct the heat into the entire building. It also serves as a buffer zone, preventing the rooms from directly facing the northwest wind.”

I displayed images on the PowerPoint—photos Cheng Xia had taken in other villages.

“This kind of sunroom has had very good warming effects in many villages. In actual daily life, it can also be used to dry clothes and for leisure and entertainment. The functionality is quite good too.”

“But herders raise livestock. With room spacing this close, it’s very inconvenient,” someone else said.

“We can build a livestock warm shelter in this location.” I pointed to the downwind area of the village. “This achieves separation of the residential area and the livestock area. Each household’s livestock can have centralized heating, saving resources, and it can also improve the entire village’s environment.”

Finally, we reached the most, most, most critical budget section.

“At the same time, we’re also compressing costs through building materials. The earthen and stone resources from Jiaolong Village’s abandoned houses can all be reused. Locally produced straw bricks made from rice straw and wheat straw stalks can be used as exterior wall filling. Including environmentally friendly blocks like fly ash, coal cinder, and coal gangue produced by nearby cities—the insulation is very good. They’re green, environmentally friendly building materials. At the same time, the proximity also saves transportation costs.”

This was the result of Bao Long and the others’ investigation.

My body still hadn’t fully recovered. After finishing the report and sitting down, my eyes still went black.

But I could still see that after several leaders consulted with each other, they gently nodded. Ba Te led the applause.

“This time it’s probably secured.”

After the meeting dispersed, he said to me excitedly, “That report was beautiful! By the way, I’ve never asked you—which university did you graduate from? Domestic? Must be a prestigious university!”